ALBANY, N.Y. - At the general store on Canada Lake in the southern Adirondacks, mice were the talk of the town this summer.
"My husband was buying mousetraps at the store and three people said, 'Do you have mice too?'" said Mary Cannon, secretary of the lake association on the body of water about 50 miles northwest of Albany. "We have over 300 families on the lake and I'll bet every one has been affected sometime this summer from excessive mice."
Now, with winter approaching, residents can expect to continue hearing the scratching of tiny feet as more of the destructive rodents move indoors to stay warm. A large berry and seed crop the mice feed on, a mild winter, and possibly fewer predators have all helped mice and other small critters thrive this year, researchers said.
"It's kind of the perfect storm, if you will, for mice," said biologist Charlotte Demers. "We're not talking plague proportions here or anything, but I think it was enough that we've gotten phone calls from a lot of local people."
At the Adirondack Ecological Center, run by the State University of New York's College of Environmental Science and Forestry, scientists say a high yield from beech trees, oaks, hickories, maples and conifers has helped propel the mouse population.
Demers said the rodents' high reproductive rates -- four to six litters a year -- along with a mild winter and dry spring have boosted survival rates.
Demers said there has also been a big jump in the red-backed vole, another small mammal that eats vegetation and seeds and, like mice, stays busy aboveground in winter.
There may also be fewer predators to decrease the population, Demers said.
After some tough years for the 22 species of small mammals in the region, the ranks of predators like foxes, coyotes, hawks, owls, bobcats, weasels and snakes has probably decreased slightly, contributing to an increase in the mouse population.
With mice that live near people heading indoors for the cooler months, the general store in Newcomb recently added a note in its electronic newsletter advertising mousetraps because some hardware stores had run out.
"If you're a homeowner, I'm pretty sure it's going to get worse before it gets better," Demers said. "Now is the time of year they're looking for places to cache their food."
Department of Environmental Conservation wildlife biologist Gordon Batcheller said the problem for homeowners is that mice enter through openings as small as a quarter inch and can proliferate despite living only months. Later, others will follow the same mouse scent into the house.
"They're essentially pregnant all the time and breeding all the time," he said. "Frankly, every home, whether it's a $10,000 shack or a $10 million mansion, at some point they're going to have mice in the house."
